More Arctic drilling

B.C. oil port to affect Alaska

Canada's energy authority gave conditional approval earlier this month to the Northern Gateway Pipeline project, which would run through British Columbia and would send hundreds more crude oil supertankers along high-traffic shipping lanes in Alaska waters.

Bad-mouthing Alaska seafood

Sushi tuna price dives

Sushi restaurateur Kiyoshi Kimura paid 7.36 million yen (about $70,000) for a 507 pound (230 kilogram) bluefin tuna in the year's celebratory first auction at Tokyo's Tsukiji market on Sunday, just one-twentieth of what he paid a year earlier despite signs the species is in serious decline.

Setnet ban disqualified

Pebble Mine nears grave

Bad to very much worse. That sums up the lack of progress in 2013 for the massive Pebble Mine, proposed by a diminishing consortium of foreign mining companies for the headwaters of the Bristol Bay wild salmon fishery in southwest Alaska.

NE restaurant cod disappears

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

POISON SPRAY ON WILLAPA BAY

Last week Ecology began inviting public comment on what to include in an environmental impact study that will examine the use of a nicotine-like pesticide to reduce the huge populations of burrowing shrimp that live in Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor.

Boycotting Canadian fish

The criticism is in a report released by the Natural Resources Defense Council, which is lobbying the U.S. administration to start enforcing a domestic law that bans imports from countries that fail to apply American sea-mammal protection rules.

Acidification changing fish

State cuts dam funding

A massive dam proposed for the Susitna River faces deep funding cuts after the Alaska Energy Authority failed to get access to thousands of acres of Alaska Native village corporation lands in the project area.

Idaho irrigation scheme

Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter aims to build billions of dollars' worth of new and expanded dams as part of his dream of capturing more water in the drought-stricken southern desert of Idaho to irrigate potatoes, grow cities and industry, and flush endangered salmon to the sea.

Thursday, January 9, 2014

BLACK MARKET DUNGENESS RING

Washington State Fish and Wildlife officers and Lummi Tribal police teamed up this week to bust an alleged illegal seafood ring that involves distributors, commercial outlets and fishermen in three counties.

Dungeness crabbers busted

In the notoriously competitive commercial crabbing industry, crabbers have plenty of financial incentive to skirt the set of regulations laid out by the state, especially during the first few weeks of the season when most of the money is made.

Halibut commissioners named

Sardine crash alarming

The decline has prompted steep cuts in the amount fishermen are allowed to catch, and scientists say the effects are probably radiating throughout the ecosystem, starving brown pelicans, sea lions and other predators that rely on the oily, energy-rich fish for food.

Conserve Kenai kings

Polar mercury declining

A team of scientists from the U.S., Russia, and Canada has compared mercury concentrations in burbot from 20 locations along the Pasvik river on the Norwegian-Russian border and along the Mackenzie River in Canada with findings from the Lena and Mezen rivers in Russian Arctic.

Trash in the sea

Tales have abounded throughout history of fearsome creatures lurking in the depths of the seas, but none of those creatures, mythical or otherwise, is as frightening as the plastic monster that humans have created by dumping trash in the ocean.

Training to sink

Instructors Torie Baker and Troy Tirrell will give participants hands-on training with emergency equipment that should be onboard any commercial fishing vessel, such as PFDs, life rafts, immersion suits, EPIRBs and fire extinguishers.

Brewing beer with dead whale

Fish farms safe

While many mainstream media articles spread the notions that coastal aquaculture is not safe for its surrounding environment, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has released a new report dispelling those myths.

Kodiak medevacs

Alaska Fisheries Report

Coming up on this Elvis Birthday Week edition: The state slaps down the Cook Inlet sports fishing industry's attempted resource grab, the Board of Fish is meeting right now in Kodiak, and why fish are more anxious than ever.